(BREVERL or AMULET ~ against Sorcery, Plague and Natural Disasters). [Germany or Poland, perhaps former Silesia, c. 1800-20].
16 small printed sheets or panels (most c. 60 × 45 mm), mainly engraved prints, but with two being typographical, probably stereotyped, one panel with tar or bitumen with impressed objects including dried flowers and seed heads, one thin brass medal. Red silk bag with gilt brocade borders, and old postally addressed envelope. Old dampstaining and fraying, affecting margins and occasionally text/image of the small prints, which have been carefully mounted on paper. Modern frame.
‘Breverls’ or folding paper amulets were produced by, or on behalf of, nuns in the eighteenth century and beyond and sold to visitors and pilgrims to convent churches. They were carried by their owners or worn around the neck, sewn into clothing or tucked into pockets. Their combination of prints of saints invoked for protection against sorcery and natural disaster is variable in different examples, but most examples include (as here) a panel of bituminised (tar) paper in which is impressed small devotional objects, texts, scraps, or pieces of plant matter considered protective. These tar panels can be elaborate and even include tiny metal medals (one is preserved here). The amulets were usually tightly folded and sealed then stitched into tightly fitting fabric or paper cases. They were not designed to be opened (indeed it was believed that doing so would nullify their efficacy). This example has been fully unfolded and conserved by mounting on paper so that each of its elements is clearly visible. From the left hand top to the bottom, the elements comprise: a ‘plague cross’ (folded sheet c. 150 × 108 mm, with an engraved print with an elaborate emblematic double cross as an amulet against sorcery, fire, plague and tempest, with text: ‘Contra Maleficia et Pestum, Contra Ignem, Pestem et Tempestales; Mary at calvary; the three Magi (with engraved prayer); Saint Francis; the Virgin; Saint Anthony of Padua; Christ turning water into wine; Saint Ignatius; Christ turning water into wine (a different version); Saint John Nepomucene; a tar panel with miniature ceramic column, red felt scrap and plant seed heads; Saints Francis, Anastasius, James, Agatha (with text); small panel of printed invocation; a larger printed invocation. The red silk bag into which all these elements were formerly sewn is preserved, as is an undated nineteenth-century envelope, postmarked ‘Neisse’ (Silesia) addressed to a recipient in nearby Neustadt O.S (upper Silesia).
Breverls are remarkable evidence for popular Catholic belief, as well as the persistence of belief in magic and the constant fear of natural disaster (fire, tempest, plague, earthquakes etc) as well as a very particular tradition of devotional commerce. The prints are rarely signed and are derived from earlier archetypes, or printed from much degraded plates, their crude execution giving an appearance of greater antiquity than is sometimes the case. Surviving examples tend to date from the second half of the eighteenth-century, though they were produced both before and after. Nineteenth-century examples often appear to be printed from much worn plates, with the minute text often illegible, giving the appearance of reproduction by some stereotype process.